‘Tug o’ war’

How will a tug o’ war, between three agencies, over the troubled Judicial Reform Support Project (JRSP) turn out? All three seek to probe a leaked World Bank report on pilfering from a $21.9-million loan to the Supreme Court.

Nagged by perception of corruption in courts, Chief Justice Hilario Davide Jr. secured, in October 2003, bank funding for a reform program. The JRSP sought (a) to speed up case adjudication, (b) enhance institutional integrity; and (c) strengthen institutional capacity.

On the first whiff of scam, Sen. Franklin Drilon filed Senate Resolution 674. It would authorize the Senate Oversight Committee on Public Expenditures to check if JRSP funds were dissipated for out-of-town trips and in lavish dinners. “Unchecked irregularity” could tar both the Court and government.

Wait, interjected Representatives Teodoro Casiño and Neri Colmenares who submitted House Resolution 2049. This directs the House Committee on Good Government and Public Accountability to lead the charge instead.

“That press release (on JRSP) is now turning out to be fake,” court spokesperson Jose Midas Marquez fumed. Nonetheless, “the Court’s Project Management Office is drafting an answer… even after it was already disowned by the World Bank.”

Rebut a “fake” report? Or does wish uproot fact?

The bank did not issue a press release. “Given the deliberative nature of information, the aide-mémoire is usually not disclosed to the public…. This is a monitoring and management tool that captures… implementation review findings and recommendations,” WB program assistant for external relations Erika Leann Lacson-Esguerra stated.

The fact is WB submitted, on Dec. 28, 2011, this report to the Court. Copies were sent to relevant agencies, including: the Department of Finance, National Economic and Development Authority and the Department of Budget and Management. The leaked document matched the official copies, these offices confirmed.

WB seeks a refund of $199,900 in “ineligible expenditures,” the Inquirer reports. Of 70 ineligible transactions, 16 were “attributed to Court Administrator Marquez and his office.” JRSP is a “high-risk” project, the report found. Its financial statements “can no longer be relied upon.” Other flaws include: self-serving internal audit, lack of segregation of duties to procurement irregularities. The Commission on Audit skewers feet-dragging implementation that resulted in penalties.

The bank’s aide-mémoire “notes gross irregularities happened in 2010 and 2011,” Budget Secretary Butch Abad pointed out. During this period, the bank observed “escalating use of funds… and procurements that violated the agreement.” Corona was appointed Chief Justice of the Supreme Court in 2010.

Court Administrator Marquez also headed the Bids and Awards Committee which held the

JRSP checkbook. “In four contracts to one firm, (Marquez) was requestor of services, approver of terms of reference, end user, authorizer of contract extensions, authorizer of payments.” This interlocking of functions resulted in “questionable decisions on how the fund was managed.”

The “leak” has a long history and valued role in journalism. Remember the late Celso Cab-

rera of the Manila Chronicle? His column “Inside Malacañang” needled the powerful with leaked items. Banned from the Palace, he retitled his column—“Outside Malacañang.”

“What are we in power for?” the late Senate President Jose Avelino told a closed-door meeting of the party in power on Jan. 15, 1949, Cabrera wrote. “Para que estamos en poder?” haunted Avelino to his grave. Despite protests of misquotation, the blurb remains part of Filipino political lexicon today.

In Pasay City, Judge Emilio Rilloraza, on Dec. 7, 1955, jailed five reporters for contempt. They published leaked information about a Cabinet secretary accused of murdering a witness and a judge blackmailed to acquit. The journalists spurned their release, which was offered on condition they “revealed” their sources to the Court.

Held in the Pasay slammer were Evening News’ Jose Aspiras, Manila Chronicle’s Francisco de Leon, Philippines Herald’s Max Edralin, Manila Times’ Manuel Salak and  Philippine News Service’s Gregorio Coronel.

The Supreme Court swiftly issued a writ of habeas corpus. President Ramon Magsaysay, thereafter, signed a shield law.

A decade later, the late Philippine News Service’s Romeo Abundo and I invoked that legal  buckler. The House of Representatives’ civil service committee insisted we reveal sources of a report on leaked test questions for 300,000 examinees. We refused.

In 1973, the New York Times and Washington Post published the “Pentagon Papers,” a secret analysis of the Vietnam War. White House “plumbers” were arrested for a Watergate break-in to ferret out medical records of Daniel Ellsberg, a Rand Corporation analyst suspected of being the source.

Turn over 64 tapes on the break in, the US Supreme Court unanimously ordered Richard Nixon in July 1974. The Court rejected Nixon’s claim of “executive privilege.” This spurred the House Judiciary Committee to impeach Nixon for “obstruction of justice.” On Aug. 8, Nixon became the first US president to resign.

Internet’s new tools spread information—or falsehood—at “warp speed.” Filipinos were the first to wage People Power through text messaging in 2001, Howard Rheingold writes in “Smart Mobs—The Next Social Revolution.”

As the tug o’ war over the JRSP story shows, “verifying facts remains the central function of journalism.” The race to be the first to break the news can be self-defeating. The critical task is to become best at sifting facts from chaff.

(Email: juan_mercado77@yahoo.com )